What my fellow classmates all seemed to be getting from the article was a the sense that “Teaching is more art than science.” Tyler Oren described it as something that needed to be “genuine and organic.” Others discussed the need for balancing what you about a student’s culture with the student’s individual styles, including Megan.
Thus, the general consensus is to blend what you know about culture, age and each individual student into a holistic approach. Is it perfect? No, but you keep trying and tweeking. Dan Kiley noted that the article’s urging that a teacher leave their comfort zone is important to this process. While keeping terms and statements general keeps things vague, and thus one is led to question the value of such wisdom, that is probably a fair price to pay for being flexible and adaptable.
Encouragingly, most of us didn’t only focus on race/ethnicity piece, (Although I did, as an example). In fact, if anything, it seemed that our class leaned a little bit more toward diversity in cognitive styles and learning patterns (Gardiner’s intelligences).
http://humaneeducation.org/
A website based on the teachings of Zoe Weil, a humane educator, looking to spread the idea of humane teaching to all classrooms.
This article brought up an interesting question for us to ponder, the balance between diversity and uniformity in school.
As an educator, I see and believe the differences among the students. Those differences mark each individual, and should be treated and considered while I plan my curriculum. Only when I see and incorporate their differences into my teaching, the students could be engaged in learning and participating. The sad fact is that the uniformity is still in practice, and the students have been treated this way for a long time. For students who doesn't respond well to traditional ways of teaching, this is affecting their confidence, self-esteem, and attitude toward school.
The curriculum, activities, assessment and even the room decoration should be varied based on the diversity in the classroom. On the other hand, there are general rule that should be applied to school, such as safety rules or procedures, should be the same for the whole school or class.
It is certainly not an easy issue for any school or teacher, but we need to keep students' learning and development in mind while we set the standards, plan out lessons and assessments.
Ethan Guthrie Herrell
Response to Diversity Article
It’s rather interesting that this article should involve so much work on cognition, because its essential thesis is that most public school classrooms are “blind” to what students know and how they know it. It lays out how clumsy the teaching in those classrooms is: it sometimes offers candy and stickers to students who are ambitious for knowledge, only to appeal to “the fascinating nature of history” to students who would rather be in a science lab or on a basketball court. A common answer to demands for African American history: bland lectures on Martin Luther King Lectures. I’ve personally had to be a mentee in a classroom where the teacher’s “diverse approach” was her giving the lecture, and the students do all the interesting projects. No activities, no discussions.
I think an excellent way of looking at how culture affects learning style is the difficulties that African American students have with English as a subject. First, the majority of them speak a dialect that is so different in verb conjugation and verb tense from all other dialects that the only real way to bridge the gap is to teach Academic English as a second language. The other problem is that African American music and literature often has a completely different approach to story-telling from the books typically valued by our largely white literary establishment. Rap songs tell stories with intricate wordplay, slang, and images from the culture that everyone recognizes. For example, this rap song by the artist Reverie: Yo, I shoulda just kept it in my stomach 9 months, Is it really that long? When I kill somebody, dog I think about it everyday That’s why I always wanna play Chewin’ pills, sniffiin’ yay Hittin’ heavens I swear I’m never fuckin’ again You think this funny But this ain’t no funny topic
If you know the slang, you know what’s happened: accidental pregnancy, abortion, cocaine use (sniffin yay, a term coined by a rapper in the early 80s), getting the ultimate high (hittin heavens). But classics such as to Kill a Mockingbird, Lord of the Flies and others rely on cultural symbolism that draws on the everything from the Bible to Greek mythology, an entirely different pool of knowledge. When I say , “scream like a banshee”, many white students, especially those with Irish ancestry, will know what I’m talking about. The screeching ladies of Irish legend who were harbingers of death. But black students probably won’t.
Jenn
Of this entire article, I found the section on the four categories of style differences the most interesting and helpful. Much of the article stated and discussed themes that, as a student of education, I’ve heard before. This section on how to break down the ways we think about style, however, was very different and I found it useful in figuring out how to approach students and their learning differences in a classroom. Although I think other information I’ve come into contact has offered similar explanation of how to handle working with different learning styles, this idea of breaking it down further, into the four categories, was extremely interesting and intriguing. Looking at it this way, I think it becomes more clear how to diagnose learning differences with a student and focus on the best approaches and techniques of how to accommodate them. I think, generally, as teachers we are focused on learning styles in the form of conceptualization. This doesn’t mean that we exclude cognition, affect or behavior from our observations or accommodations, but relating them all back to the single idea of how a person thinks limits the approaches that a teacher can take to reach a student. With the idea that conceptualization is shown through the behaviors of a student, we, as teachers, miss a large chunk of understanding how to really accommodate a student’s needs. When we tie in the categories of cognition and affect, we are then able to look into more facets of learning styles and, therefore discover more ways to teach appropriately and effectively.
___
Kevin
Diversity Article Reflection Overall, I’d say this article effectively captures what the teacher’s mindset should be. There are, however, a few things I would disagree with. For example, the article discusses the difficult decision teacher’s make about what the need to keep the same and what they should change. I have the teaching philosophy that everything should be flexible, in order to meet the students’ needs. I can’t think of a single thing that can’t be changed in order to make instruction easier to understand. On the discussion topic of special education, I can’t help but think about what one of my high school teachers told me on the subject (I interviewed him for SED 361). He has his Masters in Special Education and follows the mentality that the “tried-and-true” methods work the best. He meant that the new special education methods that are created essentially every year are not as accessible for most teachers as the strategies that have been around for a longer time. I follow this line of thinking, since I tend to feel that there is no right or wrong answer, but it is usually better to go with my gut. The other section of this article that truly caused me to think had to do with the processing of information. Every student processes information differently, so in my classroom, I will vary the way in which I give student notes. I can definitely make handouts, lecture, or have students working in groups. I’ve already decided that I wouldn’t use a pneumonics in my classroom since those can be frustrating if students know the letter but not the word.
Christina L Quach
The beginning of the article talks about uniformity which I think is an important thing to think about and how the same curriculum is applied over and over again. An ever changing curriculum is what is best. From college I have realized the best professors welcome new ideas and ways to teach to students. Another topic was about medication of students rather than first discovering if the problem comes from the teaching styles. I think this is why it is important to get to know students, teach in many different ways, and make observations every day. I had a lot of students during my practicum experience who were not being challenged, and when I got the chance to teach them in a different way the results were amazing. I think there is an important point in here that not only do students all think differently but so do the teachers. For me, as a teacher, it is important to recognize my strengths and weaknesses as a thinker/learner in order to best relate and teach to my students. Overall, respect student differences and try everything you can to help them be successful based on what you’ve learned about them. I strongly agree with a comment made in the article about how educators should have a deep understanding of culture and learning styles. I would really love to see it in action though because I have not had much exposure to a culturally diverse classroom. It ends with a good summary about what qualities can help an educator be a good educator. Overall the article was good, but I was surprised that while it was an article on diversity, it did not seem to be too diverse.
Megan Millette
It is distressing that as Guild says we teachers see that students are all different, but over the 50 year span nothing has changed to help show students that we teachers see them as individuals. We should be progressing forward thinking about students as individuals instead of teaching them “as if all students [are] the same” (Conrad, paragraph 5). Guild’s statement about education having some “absolutes” or aspects that can not be changed, but there are also aspects of the class that we can change to benefit students and keep them engaged in the learning like Guild states. As Guild states in his article, there is an imbalance in teaching that we as teachers need to pay attention to. According to Guild uniformity amongst classrooms makes for competitive classrooms both with students and teachers. Our goal should not be to compete with one another, but it should be to work with one another to make the classroom experience the best for all students. By allowing students to see teachers work together, the students will realize that they should work with one another thus helping them to walk away from the class with a batter understanding. Guild’s article helps one see the realization that we are not progressing in our learning communities like we should be. He helps one see that they should challenge their students but also pay attention to the diversity in the classroom. This will help balance out lessons based on what they discover about students. This is beneficial for all to know so they know what to look for in their different learners, and Guild also shows teachers different strategies to help makes their classes better for diverse learners. This is helpful information to have.
Kaitlyn Bukauskas
The article “Diversity, Learning Style, and Culture” by Pat Burke Guild explores the theory that all learners are individuals, and are not the same and do not always learn in the same ways, and how this idea clashes with the ways in which many schools today treat their students. Students today use the same learning materials such as textbooks and follow the same curriculum on a predetermined, uniform schedule despite the well-known ideas that an individual’s culture, socioeconomic status, and family background heavily influences his or her style of learning, making the optimal learning style unique to each and every student.
Many schools may hold onto the traditional ways of approaching learners in a uniform way for the sake of efficiency and in an effort to promote equality, however as the article points out the balance between uniformity and diversity is weighed too heavily on the side of uniformity, which does a disservice to our students. Students who hold cultural and/or family values that emphasize the importance of independence and spontaneity may feel stifled, and students who thrive from hands-on learning who are not getting appropriate outlets to utilize this approach may be labeled as hyperactive or problematic.
Implementing a learning experience to suit every student involves teachers gaining a rich understanding and ongoing research of cognition, perception, and ways in which students process and think about information. Educators can obtain information and theories which explore approaches that may suit groups of students, such as studies that explore the learning styles of girls versus boys, or specific ethnicities or race, however it is crucial to keep in mind that the learning style is specific to the individual and that what works for one student may not work for the next. For example, what is true of the “typical girl” may or may not apply to the actual student in a class.
Dan Kiley
This article over the importance of diversity has shed some light for me. Many teachers preach diversity and how important is it, and yet completely contradict themselves by leading a one-track classroom, so I must be aware of how I conduct my classroom and make sure I am open and mindful to my students. I do have one major complaint about this article and many other articles as such. I believe that by categorizing diversity we are hindering it and making into a system that can be followed, which defeats the purpose of diversity and the overarching point of the article. I understand that it is helpful to have some understanding beforehand, but to relying on studies instead of individual experiences seems wrong. It’s good to have a plan, but I think a trial and error approach is worth it. That way, the teacher and students can better understand each other, grow together, and learn together as well. It’s the responsibility of the teacher to be aware that everyone is unique and that their students styles might not match their own personal one. We, as teachers, must be able and willing to accommodate those needs in order to give our students the best learning experience possible. With that being said, it is also important for the teacher to show them different ways of learning and not just give them the most “comfortable” approach. Getting out of the comfort zone promotes growth, and that to me is far more important than making it easier for the student.
Rachel Joiner
I found this article to be interesting, and a new way of looking at education. I thought it was interesting when the author mentioned who uniform schools were. It seems that we are constantly being taught the importance of diversity, and to value this in our classrooms, however it does not seem that the modern school systems support this. Even going through school as a student, I remember the emphasis on being “unique” and being “you,” but reality was that schools were uniform, and almost contradicted the mantra to be unique. I had never really considered all the ways in which the ways that schools are uniform, can cause problems or send mixed messages to students. It seems that we send messages to students, and then at times implement policies to go against this.
It seems crazy that we unintentionally disadvantage students through various means such as making them work quietly, or sit through an entire class. To me this makes no sense. Students should be free to express themselves, and should not be constrained by norms of a school system. I agree with the author that there is no best way to teach students, and no best way to learn. Everyone is different, and learns and teaches in their own way, a way that works best for them and their personnel learning styles. After reading the article, I was reminded of the importance of constantly changing teaching styles to best meet the needs of my students. I could see how easy it would be to become comfortable with a certain teaching style, and never really change. However, I could see how this could be seriously hurting my students, and that I need to change, my teaching methods to best fit the student’s needs. Guild, B. P. (2001). Diversity, Learning Style, and Culture. John Hopkins School of Education. Retrieved from http://education.jhu.edu/PD/newhorizons/strategies/topics/Learning%20Styles/diversity.html.
Johnny B.
I am 21 years of age, beginning my final year at a higher institution of learning, studying education and English, and I still sit in rows, take tests both classroom specific and standardized, listen to teacher-centered professors, who teach to linear, auditory, and analytical learners, and compete for a final grade. I share in the proud tradition that education has been stuck in and complaining about as far back Pat Burke Guild in her essay “Diversity, Learning Style and Culture.” Burke Guild’s essay is based on a book she co-authored in 1998. She had been complaining about an entrenched system that knew what it needed to get out this rut, and here fifteen years later, the entrenched system is still too familiar and her complaints are familiar sentiments shared by those concerned with education. Her demands are all best practices; her statistics about race and education are validated by research and experience. Reading this article it is easy to fall into thinking “nothing is new under the sun,” focusing on the cyclical nature of reoccurring ideas, especially in regards to policy reform. More importantly though, it is easy to scoff and say not me with alacrity and vehemence pointing the finger at all the other lazy teachers, reformers, and politicians who allow education to be stale and stagnate. However, as the frustrations ruminates, reflexively you question yourself in honest reflection how easy it is too fall into the norms, to do what worked for you. How simple to pass it off as under the pretenses saying, “Well I was successful, now all my students should be successful like me.” Too often we write about our students as a collective and forget about the individuals, especially the individuals who fall in the middle—not the ones who are your radical opposites, the challenges that make your day interesting or the ones just like you who make you so glad you made it through. There needs to be room and recognition for all different types of students and learners and what combination of experience, events, and exposition has brought them to this moment of interaction where you and each of them are mutually intertwined and connected for the improvement of existence and the empowerment of the individual. Just like there needs to be room for each individual student, there must be room for different teaching styles. Too long have administrators fallen into hiring those who fit rather than that individual who challenge convention and defy what is accepted. The time has come to make Pat Burke Guild’s complaints in education the history they should be.
Tyler Oren
Pat Burke Guild goes to great lengths to describe the exhaustive research that has gone into understanding student learning styles, and commits a large portion of the article to discussing the varied and disparate categories a student can fall into. Guild warns the reader about a trap teachers and researchers can easily find themselves in the more research is conducted into learning styles, being classification of students into broad categories of learning styles based on specific background factors, like gender, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status. To Guild finding a preferred learning style for a particular student needs to be genuine and organic. The instructor needs to get to know the student, know what they like and dislike, along with their own individual areas of strength and areas that still need improvement. Trying map out this student as a single point on a data sheet distracts and undermines their personal needs as a student and as a person. Guild asserts that all learning styles can lead a student to a successful outcome, and reminds teachers that the most easily planned methods of delivering content can leave many students unengaged, suggesting that teachers use a variety of styles to deliver content. Alternatively Guild also warns teachers not to focus too heavily on less commonly used styles as well as they can cause a teacher and their class to stumble if applied too frequently. Guild closes claiming that there is still little substitute for an exceptional teacher, a passionate and knowledgeable instruction can most often engage any kind of learner with their enthusiasm, but informed accommodations for every kind of student will foster even greater success for students.
Cheyenne McCarthy
Pat Guild’s article, titled Diversity, Leaning Style and Culture, discusses the individual learner. Guild discusses many topics and ideas related to the education systems practice surrounding diversity; more importantly, the lack thereof. Diversity is a pretty broad term when used in an educational setting. Many factors contribute to who a person truly is and how he/she learns. Throughout the article, Guild addresses many ideas supporting the need for change and a movement towards individualization. Guild also poses numerous questions regarding what and how to make changes that are not only effective but beneficial, too. Guild dives right into the notion that, although teachers and educators know that not all learners are the same, they are still being taught as if they are the same in schools across the nation. The same textbooks, usually quite dated, are provided to all students, regardless of how they learn. When a student goes into his/her Biology class, he/she is learning the exact same material as the other 20 students also in that class, and together they are learning the same material that was taught to the last class, whether it was taught yesterday or a year ago. There is little diversity in how subjects are being taught. When you walk into a classroom you see the faces of your students, do any of them look exactly alike? Most likely the answer is no, they all look quite different from one another, granted a few may have the same hair color, eye color, style, etc. We must see this as a paradigm for which we compare the learning styles and needs of each student. Some students feel more comfortable writing and some feel more comfortable drawing. Some students understand by hearing and/or seeing a demonstration whereas others learn by doing it themselves. We should take into account whom our students truly are. Jim Rohn said, “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” I believe everyone should be considering this in two different ways. First, we must realize that each of our students are a combination of the five people they surround themselves with, meaning parents/family and friends. We must take socioeconomic status, home life, culture, and numerous other factors into consideration when it comes to the productivity and success of each student. The second way I see this quote is that as a teacher, you are a big part of each student’s life, you are with them every other day for at least 80 minutes. Be a positive role model; consider yourself in their shoes, this way you can help promote positive attitudes and change.
Mel Christensen
I found that this article seemed to contain conflicting messages. Guild claims that it is important to consider the culture of a student when evaluating their learning style, but also to recognize that you cannot judge a student based on their cultural background. In my opinion, it is important to consider both the culture and the learning style of a student, but neither universally informs the other. Understanding the culture and learning style of a student is invaluable in helping him or her make progress academically and socially, but they should not define a student. As a teacher, I think it is important to build an environment in the classroom where diversity is recognized and respected. Students need to know how to interact with people who are different from themselves, and modeling how to do this in schools is important. At the same time, I think teachers should refrain from over emphasizing diversity in certain situations. Some students may not want to constantly be identified by their culture, or learning style, but may want to be known for a talent or personality trait.
I appreciated the section of the article that looked at how people process information and situations and react in different ways. This is a more subtle aspect of diversity that people don’t often appreciate or reflect on. Many misunderstandings and disagreements arise from the fact that people may process information in different ways and I think it is important that students learn to appreciate that not everyone thinks the way they do, and often people will react to the same situation in very different ways.
Lauren Breton
I really liked how the author of the article talked about different approaches to issues that we’re all facing every day, such as planning. Since I’m a linear planner, and not a holistic planner, I often forget that one can approach teaching and organizing in a way that is more big-picture. I really like the comparison of seeing the forest versus seeing the trees that was provided to illustrate these two different approaches to teaching, because I think that I tend to get so hung up on the trees sometimes that I can’t see the forest. I have also never thought about myself as being an impulsive learner, although I completely am. I tend to do very well in seminar-type classes because they enable each student to contribute to a discussion whenever they want to, and because I like to blurt out ideas as soon as they come into my head, I am able to participate effectively. I also have a habit of blurting out my ideas to myself because that helps me to process what I’m working on and work through my thoughts. Although I felt like this article focused on many things that we have discussed and read about in education classes before, it was a nice way to recap and get us thinking about our own philosophies of education and was a nice way to segue into this course. Also, I feel like we have not really discussed our own cultures and what our own personal experiences as human beings brings into our classroom, so I found the small segment on the culture of each individual teacher to be something interesting to think about and consider.
Kalib Moore
The main argument that author Pat Guild is arguing in his article "Diversity, Learning Style and Culture" is that education systems throughout the world need to step away from the stereotypes different cultures have of students' learning styles and begin to focus on the idea that each and every student learns differently and we need to be cautious of how we are teaching students in terms of uniformity. Student's are being treated as if they are just another number, grouped with other children their age, and in some cases from the same background or culture, and forced to read the same books, and learn in the same ways regardless of their individual learning styles. It is time for schools to step away from the rigid, monotonous ways of public education and move towards focusing on individual student's desires and needs in their journey of learning.
Guild starts his argument by pointing out, "We also know that an individual learner's culture, family background, and socioeconomic level affect his or her learning." Far too often middle school and especially high school courses have requirements such as advanced calculators and a variety of different types of notebooks that some students may not be able to afford which puts them at a disadvantage to the students coming from stronger SES backgrounds. Other classrooms have teachers who feel most comfortable teaching with an overhead projector and writing notes on the board for students to copy. This is not necessarily the strategy each student in the class feels strongest with when trying to learn. It is important for teachers to see the diversity in their community, school, as well as their classroom. Taking the opportunity to figure out each student’s learning styles would result in better, richer connections and conversations with students as well as making a healthier learning environment.
Ethan Guthrie HerrellDiversity Article Synthesis
What my fellow classmates all seemed to be getting from the article was a the sense that “Teaching is more art than science.” Tyler Oren described it as something that needed to be “genuine and organic.” Others discussed the need for balancing what you about a student’s culture with the student’s individual styles, including Megan.
Thus, the general consensus is to blend what you know about culture, age and each individual student into a holistic approach. Is it perfect? No, but you keep trying and tweeking. Dan Kiley noted that the article’s urging that a teacher leave their comfort zone is important to this process. While keeping terms and statements general keeps things vague, and thus one is led to question the value of such wisdom, that is probably a fair price to pay for being flexible and adaptable.
Encouragingly, most of us didn’t only focus on race/ethnicity piece, (Although I did, as an example). In fact, if anything, it seemed that our class leaned a little bit more toward diversity in cognitive styles and learning patterns (Gardiner’s intelligences).
Helping English Language Learners in math: http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/article/10-ways-help-ells-succeed-math
Need to talk about the Stonewall Riots and their importance in LGBTQ history?: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/teachers-resources/stonewall-guide/
Hyperlinks
http://humaneeducation.org/A website based on the teachings of Zoe Weil, a humane educator, looking to spread the idea of humane teaching to all classrooms.
Table of Contents
Meng Hardy
This article brought up an interesting question for us to ponder, the balance between diversity and uniformity in school.
As an educator, I see and believe the differences among the students. Those differences mark each individual, and should be treated and considered while I plan my curriculum. Only when I see and incorporate their differences into my teaching, the students could be engaged in learning and participating. The sad fact is that the uniformity is still in practice, and the students have been treated this way for a long time. For students who doesn't respond well to traditional ways of teaching, this is affecting their confidence, self-esteem, and attitude toward school.
The curriculum, activities, assessment and even the room decoration should be varied based on the diversity in the classroom. On the other hand, there are general rule that should be applied to school, such as safety rules or procedures, should be the same for the whole school or class.
It is certainly not an easy issue for any school or teacher, but we need to keep students' learning and development in mind while we set the standards, plan out lessons and assessments.
Ethan Guthrie Herrell
Response to Diversity Article
It’s rather interesting that this article should involve so much work on cognition, because its essential thesis is that most public school classrooms are “blind” to what students know and how they know it. It lays out how clumsy the teaching in those classrooms is: it sometimes offers candy and stickers to students who are ambitious for knowledge, only to appeal to “the fascinating nature of history” to students who would rather be in a science lab or on a basketball court. A common answer to demands for African American history: bland lectures on Martin Luther King Lectures. I’ve personally had to be a mentee in a classroom where the teacher’s “diverse approach” was her giving the lecture, and the students do all the interesting projects. No activities, no discussions.
I think an excellent way of looking at how culture affects learning style is the difficulties that African American students have with English as a subject. First, the majority of them speak a dialect that is so different in verb conjugation and verb tense from all other dialects that the only real way to bridge the gap is to teach Academic English as a second language. The other problem is that African American music and literature often has a completely different approach to story-telling from the books typically valued by our largely white literary establishment. Rap songs tell stories with intricate wordplay, slang, and images from the culture that everyone recognizes. For example, this rap song by the artist Reverie:
Yo, I shoulda just kept it in my stomach
9 months,
Is it really that long?
When I kill somebody, dog
I think about it everyday
That’s why I always wanna play
Chewin’ pills, sniffiin’ yay
Hittin’ heavens
I swear I’m never fuckin’ again
You think this funny
But this ain’t no funny topic
If you know the slang, you know what’s happened: accidental pregnancy, abortion, cocaine use (sniffin yay, a term coined by a rapper in the early 80s), getting the ultimate high (hittin heavens). But classics such as to Kill a Mockingbird, Lord of the Flies and others rely on cultural symbolism that draws on the everything from the Bible to Greek mythology, an entirely different pool of knowledge. When I say , “scream like a banshee”, many white students, especially those with Irish ancestry, will know what I’m talking about. The screeching ladies of Irish legend who were harbingers of death. But black students probably won’t.
Jenn
Of this entire article, I found the section on the four categories of style differences the most interesting and helpful. Much of the article stated and discussed themes that, as a student of education, I’ve heard before. This section on how to break down the ways we think about style, however, was very different and I found it useful in figuring out how to approach students and their learning differences in a classroom. Although I think other information I’ve come into contact has offered similar explanation of how to handle working with different learning styles, this idea of breaking it down further, into the four categories, was extremely interesting and intriguing. Looking at it this way, I think it becomes more clear how to diagnose learning differences with a student and focus on the best approaches and techniques of how to accommodate them. I think, generally, as teachers we are focused on learning styles in the form of conceptualization. This doesn’t mean that we exclude cognition, affect or behavior from our observations or accommodations, but relating them all back to the single idea of how a person thinks limits the approaches that a teacher can take to reach a student. With the idea that conceptualization is shown through the behaviors of a student, we, as teachers, miss a large chunk of understanding how to really accommodate a student’s needs. When we tie in the categories of cognition and affect, we are then able to look into more facets of learning styles and, therefore discover more ways to teach appropriately and effectively.
___
Kevin
Diversity Article Reflection Overall, I’d say this article effectively captures what the teacher’s mindset should be. There are, however, a few things I would disagree with. For example, the article discusses the difficult decision teacher’s make about what the need to keep the same and what they should change. I have the teaching philosophy that everything should be flexible, in order to meet the students’ needs. I can’t think of a single thing that can’t be changed in order to make instruction easier to understand. On the discussion topic of special education, I can’t help but think about what one of my high school teachers told me on the subject (I interviewed him for SED 361). He has his Masters in Special Education and follows the mentality that the “tried-and-true” methods work the best. He meant that the new special education methods that are created essentially every year are not as accessible for most teachers as the strategies that have been around for a longer time. I follow this line of thinking, since I tend to feel that there is no right or wrong answer, but it is usually better to go with my gut.
The other section of this article that truly caused me to think had to do with the processing of information. Every student processes information differently, so in my classroom, I will vary the way in which I give student notes. I can definitely make handouts, lecture, or have students working in groups. I’ve already decided that I wouldn’t use a pneumonics in my classroom since those can be frustrating if students know the letter but not the word.
Christina L Quach
The beginning of the article talks about uniformity which I think is an important thing to think about and how the same curriculum is applied over and over again. An ever changing curriculum is what is best. From college I have realized the best professors welcome new ideas and ways to teach to students. Another topic was about medication of students rather than first discovering if the problem comes from the teaching styles. I think this is why it is important to get to know students, teach in many different ways, and make observations every day. I had a lot of students during my practicum experience who were not being challenged, and when I got the chance to teach them in a different way the results were amazing. I think there is an important point in here that not only do students all think differently but so do the teachers. For me, as a teacher, it is important to recognize my strengths and weaknesses as a thinker/learner in order to best relate and teach to my students. Overall, respect student differences and try everything you can to help them be successful based on what you’ve learned about them. I strongly agree with a comment made in the article about how educators should have a deep understanding of culture and learning styles. I would really love to see it in action though because I have not had much exposure to a culturally diverse classroom. It ends with a good summary about what qualities can help an educator be a good educator. Overall the article was good, but I was surprised that while it was an article on diversity, it did not seem to be too diverse.
Megan Millette
It is distressing that as Guild says we teachers see that students are all different, but over the 50 year span nothing has changed to help show students that we teachers see them as individuals. We should be progressing forward thinking about students as individuals instead of teaching them “as if all students [are] the same” (Conrad, paragraph 5). Guild’s statement about education having some “absolutes” or aspects that can not be changed, but there are also aspects of the class that we can change to benefit students and keep them engaged in the learning like Guild states. As Guild states in his article, there is an imbalance in teaching that we as teachers need to pay attention to. According to Guild uniformity amongst classrooms makes for competitive classrooms both with students and teachers. Our goal should not be to compete with one another, but it should be to work with one another to make the classroom experience the best for all students. By allowing students to see teachers work together, the students will realize that they should work with one another thus helping them to walk away from the class with a batter understanding. Guild’s article helps one see the realization that we are not progressing in our learning communities like we should be. He helps one see that they should challenge their students but also pay attention to the diversity in the classroom. This will help balance out lessons based on what they discover about students. This is beneficial for all to know so they know what to look for in their different learners, and Guild also shows teachers different strategies to help makes their classes better for diverse learners. This is helpful information to have.
Kaitlyn Bukauskas
The article “Diversity, Learning Style, and Culture” by Pat Burke Guild explores the theory that all learners are individuals, and are not the same and do not always learn in the same ways, and how this idea clashes with the ways in which many schools today treat their students. Students today use the same learning materials such as textbooks and follow the same curriculum on a predetermined, uniform schedule despite the well-known ideas that an individual’s culture, socioeconomic status, and family background heavily influences his or her style of learning, making the optimal learning style unique to each and every student.
Many schools may hold onto the traditional ways of approaching learners in a uniform way for the sake of efficiency and in an effort to promote equality, however as the article points out the balance between uniformity and diversity is weighed too heavily on the side of uniformity, which does a disservice to our students. Students who hold cultural and/or family values that emphasize the importance of independence and spontaneity may feel stifled, and students who thrive from hands-on learning who are not getting appropriate outlets to utilize this approach may be labeled as hyperactive or problematic.
Implementing a learning experience to suit every student involves teachers gaining a rich understanding and ongoing research of cognition, perception, and ways in which students process and think about information. Educators can obtain information and theories which explore approaches that may suit groups of students, such as studies that explore the learning styles of girls versus boys, or specific ethnicities or race, however it is crucial to keep in mind that the learning style is specific to the individual and that what works for one student may not work for the next. For example, what is true of the “typical girl” may or may not apply to the actual student in a class.
Dan Kiley
This article over the importance of diversity has shed some light for me. Many teachers preach diversity and how important is it, and yet completely contradict themselves by leading a one-track classroom, so I must be aware of how I conduct my classroom and make sure I am open and mindful to my students. I do have one major complaint about this article and many other articles as such. I believe that by categorizing diversity we are hindering it and making into a system that can be followed, which defeats the purpose of diversity and the overarching point of the article. I understand that it is helpful to have some understanding beforehand, but to relying on studies instead of individual experiences seems wrong. It’s good to have a plan, but I think a trial and error approach is worth it. That way, the teacher and students can better understand each other, grow together, and learn together as well. It’s the responsibility of the teacher to be aware that everyone is unique and that their students styles might not match their own personal one. We, as teachers, must be able and willing to accommodate those needs in order to give our students the best learning experience possible. With that being said, it is also important for the teacher to show them different ways of learning and not just give them the most “comfortable” approach. Getting out of the comfort zone promotes growth, and that to me is far more important than making it easier for the student.
Rachel Joiner
I found this article to be interesting, and a new way of looking at education. I thought it was interesting when the author mentioned who uniform schools were. It seems that we are constantly being taught the importance of diversity, and to value this in our classrooms, however it does not seem that the modern school systems support this. Even going through school as a student, I remember the emphasis on being “unique” and being “you,” but reality was that schools were uniform, and almost contradicted the mantra to be unique. I had never really considered all the ways in which the ways that schools are uniform, can cause problems or send mixed messages to students. It seems that we send messages to students, and then at times implement policies to go against this.
It seems crazy that we unintentionally disadvantage students through various means such as making them work quietly, or sit through an entire class. To me this makes no sense. Students should be free to express themselves, and should not be constrained by norms of a school system. I agree with the author that there is no best way to teach students, and no best way to learn. Everyone is different, and learns and teaches in their own way, a way that works best for them and their personnel learning styles. After reading the article, I was reminded of the importance of constantly changing teaching styles to best meet the needs of my students. I could see how easy it would be to become comfortable with a certain teaching style, and never really change. However, I could see how this could be seriously hurting my students, and that I need to change, my teaching methods to best fit the student’s needs.
Guild, B. P. (2001). Diversity, Learning Style, and Culture. John Hopkins School of Education. Retrieved from
http://education.jhu.edu/PD/newhorizons/strategies/topics/Learning%20Styles/diversity.html.
Johnny B.
I am 21 years of age, beginning my final year at a higher institution of learning, studying education and English, and I still sit in rows, take tests both classroom specific and standardized, listen to teacher-centered professors, who teach to linear, auditory, and analytical learners, and compete for a final grade. I share in the proud tradition that education has been stuck in and complaining about as far back Pat Burke Guild in her essay “Diversity, Learning Style and Culture.”Burke Guild’s essay is based on a book she co-authored in 1998. She had been complaining about an entrenched system that knew what it needed to get out this rut, and here fifteen years later, the entrenched system is still too familiar and her complaints are familiar sentiments shared by those concerned with education. Her demands are all best practices; her statistics about race and education are validated by research and experience.
Reading this article it is easy to fall into thinking “nothing is new under the sun,” focusing on the cyclical nature of reoccurring ideas, especially in regards to policy reform. More importantly though, it is easy to scoff and say not me with alacrity and vehemence pointing the finger at all the other lazy teachers, reformers, and politicians who allow education to be stale and stagnate. However, as the frustrations ruminates, reflexively you question yourself in honest reflection how easy it is too fall into the norms, to do what worked for you. How simple to pass it off as under the pretenses saying, “Well I was successful, now all my students should be successful like me.” Too often we write about our students as a collective and forget about the individuals, especially the individuals who fall in the middle—not the ones who are your radical opposites, the challenges that make your day interesting or the ones just like you who make you so glad you made it through.
There needs to be room and recognition for all different types of students and learners and what combination of experience, events, and exposition has brought them to this moment of interaction where you and each of them are mutually intertwined and connected for the improvement of existence and the empowerment of the individual. Just like there needs to be room for each individual student, there must be room for different teaching styles. Too long have administrators fallen into hiring those who fit rather than that individual who challenge convention and defy what is accepted. The time has come to make Pat Burke Guild’s complaints in education the history they should be.
Tyler Oren
Pat Burke Guild goes to great lengths to describe the exhaustive research that has gone into understanding student learning styles, and commits a large portion of the article to discussing the varied and disparate categories a student can fall into. Guild warns the reader about a trap teachers and researchers can easily find themselves in the more research is conducted into learning styles, being classification of students into broad categories of learning styles based on specific background factors, like gender, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status.
To Guild finding a preferred learning style for a particular student needs to be genuine and organic. The instructor needs to get to know the student, know what they like and dislike, along with their own individual areas of strength and areas that still need improvement. Trying map out this student as a single point on a data sheet distracts and undermines their personal needs as a student and as a person.
Guild asserts that all learning styles can lead a student to a successful outcome, and reminds teachers that the most easily planned methods of delivering content can leave many students unengaged, suggesting that teachers use a variety of styles to deliver content. Alternatively Guild also warns teachers not to focus too heavily on less commonly used styles as well as they can cause a teacher and their class to stumble if applied too frequently.
Guild closes claiming that there is still little substitute for an exceptional teacher, a passionate and knowledgeable instruction can most often engage any kind of learner with their enthusiasm, but informed accommodations for every kind of student will foster even greater success for students.
Cheyenne McCarthy
Pat Guild’s article, titled Diversity, Leaning Style and Culture, discusses the individual learner. Guild discusses many topics and ideas related to the education systems practice surrounding diversity; more importantly, the lack thereof. Diversity is a pretty broad term when used in an educational setting. Many factors contribute to who a person truly is and how he/she learns. Throughout the article, Guild addresses many ideas supporting the need for change and a movement towards individualization. Guild also poses numerous questions regarding what and how to make changes that are not only effective but beneficial, too.Guild dives right into the notion that, although teachers and educators know that not all learners are the same, they are still being taught as if they are the same in schools across the nation. The same textbooks, usually quite dated, are provided to all students, regardless of how they learn. When a student goes into his/her Biology class, he/she is learning the exact same material as the other 20 students also in that class, and together they are learning the same material that was taught to the last class, whether it was taught yesterday or a year ago. There is little diversity in how subjects are being taught.
When you walk into a classroom you see the faces of your students, do any of them look exactly alike? Most likely the answer is no, they all look quite different from one another, granted a few may have the same hair color, eye color, style, etc. We must see this as a paradigm for which we compare the learning styles and needs of each student. Some students feel more comfortable writing and some feel more comfortable drawing. Some students understand by hearing and/or seeing a demonstration whereas others learn by doing it themselves. We should take into account whom our students truly are.
Jim Rohn said, “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” I believe everyone should be considering this in two different ways. First, we must realize that each of our students are a combination of the five people they surround themselves with, meaning parents/family and friends. We must take socioeconomic status, home life, culture, and numerous other factors into consideration when it comes to the productivity and success of each student. The second way I see this quote is that as a teacher, you are a big part of each student’s life, you are with them every other day for at least 80 minutes. Be a positive role model; consider yourself in their shoes, this way you can help promote positive attitudes and change.
Mel Christensen
I found that this article seemed to contain conflicting messages. Guild claims that it is important to consider the culture of a student when evaluating their learning style, but also to recognize that you cannot judge a student based on their cultural background. In my opinion, it is important to consider both the culture and the learning style of a student, but neither universally informs the other. Understanding the culture and learning style of a student is invaluable in helping him or her make progress academically and socially, but they should not define a student. As a teacher, I think it is important to build an environment in the classroom where diversity is recognized and respected. Students need to know how to interact with people who are different from themselves, and modeling how to do this in schools is important. At the same time, I think teachers should refrain from over emphasizing diversity in certain situations. Some students may not want to constantly be identified by their culture, or learning style, but may want to be known for a talent or personality trait.
I appreciated the section of the article that looked at how people process information and situations and react in different ways. This is a more subtle aspect of diversity that people don’t often appreciate or reflect on. Many misunderstandings and disagreements arise from the fact that people may process information in different ways and I think it is important that students learn to appreciate that not everyone thinks the way they do, and often people will react to the same situation in very different ways.
Lauren Breton
I really liked how the author of the article talked about different approaches to issues that we’re all facing every day, such as planning. Since I’m a linear planner, and not a holistic planner, I often forget that one can approach teaching and organizing in a way that is more big-picture. I really like the comparison of seeing the forest versus seeing the trees that was provided to illustrate these two different approaches to teaching, because I think that I tend to get so hung up on the trees sometimes that I can’t see the forest. I have also never thought about myself as being an impulsive learner, although I completely am. I tend to do very well in seminar-type classes because they enable each student to contribute to a discussion whenever they want to, and because I like to blurt out ideas as soon as they come into my head, I am able to participate effectively. I also have a habit of blurting out my ideas to myself because that helps me to process what I’m working on and work through my thoughts. Although I felt like this article focused on many things that we have discussed and read about in education classes before, it was a nice way to recap and get us thinking about our own philosophies of education and was a nice way to segue into this course. Also, I feel like we have not really discussed our own cultures and what our own personal experiences as human beings brings into our classroom, so I found the small segment on the culture of each individual teacher to be something interesting to think about and consider.Kalib Moore
The main argument that author Pat Guild is arguing in his article "Diversity, Learning Style and Culture" is that education systems throughout the world need to step away from the stereotypes different cultures have of students' learning styles and begin to focus on the idea that each and every student learns differently and we need to be cautious of how we are teaching students in terms of uniformity. Student's are being treated as if they are just another number, grouped with other children their age, and in some cases from the same background or culture, and forced to read the same books, and learn in the same ways regardless of their individual learning styles. It is time for schools to step away from the rigid, monotonous ways of public education and move towards focusing on individual student's desires and needs in their journey of learning.
Guild starts his argument by pointing out, "We also know that an individual learner's culture, family background, and socioeconomic level affect his or her learning." Far too often middle school and especially high school courses have requirements such as advanced calculators and a variety of different types of notebooks that some students may not be able to afford which puts them at a disadvantage to the students coming from stronger SES backgrounds. Other classrooms have teachers who feel most comfortable teaching with an overhead projector and writing notes on the board for students to copy. This is not necessarily the strategy each student in the class feels strongest with when trying to learn. It is important for teachers to see the diversity in their community, school, as well as their classroom. Taking the opportunity to figure out each student’s learning styles would result in better, richer connections and conversations with students as well as making a healthier learning environment.